In garment making, first a pattern is cut to actually form a garment from the design created by the designer. Usually, such patterns are made by hand or by using an apparel CAD; the pattern making and the pattern drafting process is called pattern making and pattern drafting. (In this specification, the term "pattern" is used to refer to a broad concept, including patterns displayed on the screen of a CAD machine from which paper patterns are cut.)
Whether the finished garment is comfortable to wear and whether the image intended by the designer is reflected properly in the garment depend on how accurate the pattern is made. The quality of the pattern in turn depends on the skill of individuals, whether an apparel CAD is used or not, and under the current circumstances, it largely depends on the workmanship of skilled patternmakers.
On the other hand, with the recent trend toward diversification and individuality of dress fashion design, apparel makers are urged to supply garments in a variety of designs and for different types of body shapes and sizes. Under these circumstances, apparel makers are being pressed with increasing amount of pattern making and pattern drafting work, and hence, the need to further reduce the time required for pattern making and pattern drafting. It is therefore imperative to reduce the dependence of pattern making and pattern drafting on skilled workers only.
Various approaches have been made to solve such a problem, and one such approach, which aims at reducing the time and labor required for pattern making and pattern drafting by improving apparel CAD, is disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 54-161446. In the apparel CAD described in this Publication, processing instructions for pattern making and pattern drafting are supplied, using an instruction sheet, to a system in which a plurality of base patterns and pattern making and pattern drafting theories are prestored. Using this apparel CAD, the time and labor required for pattern making and pattern drafting can be reduced to a certain extent.
However, with the apparel CAD disclosed in the above Publication, since processing instructions for pattern making and pattern drafting have to be entered using an instruction sheet, the apparel CAD is not easy for the operator to use. For example, to add gathers, the above prior art apparel CAD requires that the distance, etc., from the center of the gather stop position be entered as numeric values into the instruction sheet. In an actual pattern making and pattern drafting process, however, skilled patternmakers recognize the distance from the center of the gather stop position by intuition, not as numeric values. If such items which are normally grasped intuitively are entered as numeric values in the instruction sheet for CAD processing, the final result will be different from what was perceived intuitively. Furthermore, since the process of preparing such an instruction sheet is different in nature from the process of operating a conventional apparel CAD, the work is cumbersome for those well skilled in CAD operations.
Furthermore, in the apparel CAD described in the above Patent Publication, the above numeric values are only given in actual dimensions, i.e., as absolute coordinates; therefore, the processing contents of the instruction sheet cannot be applied directly to the making of other patterns in a different size, and such processing as multiplication by a predetermined ratio becomes necessary. Moreover, when the processing contents of the instruction sheet are applied to the making of other patterns for a different body type, a proper pattern cannot be obtained even if the multiplication by a predetermined ratio, as described above, is performed. In such a case, the finished garment will not be comfortable to wear, nor will the design image intended by the designer be reflected into the garment.
The present invention has been devised to overcome the above problems associated with the prior art, and it is an object of the invention to provide a pattern making and pattern drafting system capable of making patterns based on the pattern making and pattern drafting process actually performed on a reference pattern (one of the original base patterns made by skilled patternmakers). It is another object of the invention to provide a pattern making and pattern drafting system capable of reproducing the comfortable cut and design image of the reference pattern in other body types' patterns even when the pattern making and pattern drafting process for the reference pattern is repeated for the making of other patterns for different body types.